Wednesday, June 27, 2012

As I travel to Newark for tomorrow night’s NBA draft, there are
still doubters that Marquette will leave tomorrow night as one of only 15
colleges with seven or more NBA players or draftees (see complete table at end
of post of all teams).

The average of 11 mock drafts had DJO as a somewhat shaky 47th
pick, and Crowder as a very borderline 57th of 60 picks. Many in public drafts simply believe both are
too short to make it in the NBA, and even MU fans don’t hold out much hope for
a third straight year of a surprise first round pick (Hayward, Butler) after
the disappointment of the Three Amigos being passed over, as shown by this poll on MU Scoop:

MU Fans

Crowder

DJO

1st round

15%

10%

Top 45 picks

51%

46%

46-60th pick

25%

33%

Undrafted

9%

11%

If Crowder or DJO are called 30th, they are
locked into contracts close to $1,020,960 for this coming season and $1,066,920
for 2013-14. If they are picked 31st
through 60th, as most MU fans expect, then they are basically trying
out for a team. If not at all, their
odds of making a team go down, but they can pick between offers and try the
Wesley Matthews route, which resulted in a $9 million second year contract, the
biggest ever for a second year player, precisely because he was NOT locked into
a 2nd year deal.

Those who rely more on the eye test believe DJO’s 41.5 inch
vertical, tops of all prospects, vaulted him to a higher level.

I took the projected Draft Order from Draft Express, which
was the most accurate in projecting the players invited to the NBA combine, and
matched them with the minutes played by the rookies this year and added them
into last year’s total. (Normally that
would make the overall minutes too high, but because of the strike, it works
out about right.)

Brandon Knight played the most minutes of any rookie this
year (2128 for Detroit), so I gave Anthony Davis and Kentucky 2128 minutes for
him as the No. 1 pick in Draft Express.
Going down the list, that gives Draft Express 43rd pick
Crowder a projected 331 minutes (same as E’Twaun Moore put in for Boston for 43rd
among rookies), and DJO projects at 243 minutes as the 49th pick in
Draft Express (same as Malcolm Lee got for Minnesota).

If that played out, Marquette would actually DROP to 17th
in NBA minutes next year even with the additions of DJO and Crowder, being passed by Syracuse (Dion Waiters, Fab Melo and
Kris Joseph add 2630 minutes to get them to 7769), but other than that only
behind UConn in the Big East.

The closest competition MU would have within the conference
would be from future member Memphis (4843 minutes to be 4 spots behind MU at 21st
overall), Georgetown (4363, 23rd) and Villanova (4316, 24th). There would still be a nice drop from there
to the rest of the conference, with Moe Harkless likely adding a lot of minutes
to what is already being put up by Crowder’s favorite player, the former Ron
Artest/Metta World Peace and a few from DJ Kennedy.

The minutes by conference are followed by the Big East teams
(only teams with 2000 or more minutes included), followed by the new projected national leaders. Intresting that the trio of MU, Georgetown and Villanova are the top three NBA producers except for UConn.

ACC - 77405 NBA Minutes projected next season

SEC - 59930

Pac 12 - 57769

Big East - 48166

Big 12 - 36832

Others - 33631

Big Ten – 28031 (great teams, but the style does not lend itself)

And here is the table of the Big East teams who should have at least 2000 minutes:

Rnk

Team

2012

2012 Min

Projected 2012 Picks

Draft Min

Proj Min

5

Connecticut

12

11656

Andre Drummond C, Jeremy Lamb SG

2989

14645

14

Syracuse

6

5139

Dion Waiters SG, Fab Melo C, Kris Joseph SF

2630

7769

17

Marquette

5

5373

Jae Crowder SF/PF, Darius Johnson-Odom PG/SG

574

5947

23

Georgetown

3

4228

Henry Sims PF/C

135

4363

24

Villanova

3

4316

None this year

0

4316

36

St. John's

2

1722

Moe Harkless SF

1227

2949

37

Cincinnati

3

2848

None this year

0

2848

39

Louisville

5

2778

None this year

0

2778

45

Pittsburgh

3

2551

None this year

0

2551

Total Big East Min

42

40611

not counted 654 WVU, etc.

7555

48166

And Kentucky would overtake Duke and UCLA for the top spot, with Missouri and Baylor breaking into the Top 50 overall. Interesting that the top 6 teams hardly play football, except for an occasional team for UNC: